On Tue, Jan 09, 2007 at 08:22:20AM +0100, Dirk wrote:> If there is no problem with Linux gaming I should shut the hell up and > start buying all these Linux games I keep hearing about and seeing in > those TV commercials.

There is no problem with linux gaming. There is a problem with gamedevelopment companies and their marketing decisions. Unless you somehowmake linux have 100% compatible directx and able to natively executewindows code, the game companies aren't going to give a @#$#. They havea limited budget and for them it is more important to aim for 99% of themarket than 100% of the market if it means saving 20 or 30% indevelopment costs. Even if it saves 5% in development cost, it makessense financially.

Some companies of course realize that the installation base does notalways equal the gamer installation base and write portable code in thefirst place using abstraction layers where needed, and stick to opengland such. This is why quake, and other titles from ID are ported tolinux and mac and such. Some companies believe the hype from microsoftabout directx and write for that instead, which makes the games notportable to mac or linux or anything else.

The problem is not that linux doesn't have any decent stable api forgames. The problem is that it isn't directx which is what a lot ofcompanies believe they want to use.

I play neverwinters nights on my linux system. I have never seen it onwindows. Linux uses opengl, while I have no idea if the windows versionis opengl or directx or maybe lets you pick (some games offer a choiceof rendering engine). I do know the game runs great for the most parteven though my hardware is below the minimum specs if I was running onwindows (at least according to the box for the game).